Welcome to the Mind of Batman
by RedHood97
Summary: The League become trapped in Batman's memories by Dr. Destiny and must try to escape before they are driven to despair by the extent of Batman's loss. Disclaimer: I own nothing, it is the property of DC Comics.
1. Chapter 1

**A/N: For the sake of this story, the League all knows each other's secret identities, but not the details surrounding them.**

"Where are we?" Superman questioned as they gazed around the black landscape that had surrounded them since they awoke a few minutes ago. The rest of the founders also gazed around, examining everything around them to find some clue as to where they were.

For as far as they could see there was infinite darkness. Not just darkness, like a shadow, but a complete absence of light except for the area lit by Green Lantern's ring, which cast an eerie green glow onto the surrounding blackness.

A voice suddenly boomed out all around them, "Welcome, Justice League. It is long overdue that I exact my revenge upon you for derailing my plans." Unfortunately it was a voice that they all recognized. Dr. Destiny. That explained where they were; trapped in a collective dream.

The voice continued, "The first time we encountered one another I isolated you and confronted you all with your darkest fears. But that plan failed. Now, I know precisely how to defeat you all. By confronting you with memories of great pain from one who you consider your ally. The one who defeated me. The Batman. You are all currently trapped within the nexus point of Batman's memories. You will then be forced to endure the darkest points of the Batman's life, forced to feel the emotions that are attached with them and forced to forever live with the knowledge of how damaged the Dark Knight truly is." He paused before saying, "That is, if any you survive with your sanity intact." The voice faded away, chuckling as it did so.

Before the League could question Batman about his past, the darkness began to shift and stir around them, twisting into recognizable shapes. Building began forming around them, leaving them in a dark, dank alleyway that was littered with filth.

Batman breathed in sharply, already knowing where the first memory was. technically it was _the first memory._ The memory that birthed the Batman. The cesspool that gave rise to Gotham's Dark Defender.

No one remembers the true name of the alley, for its description long ago replaced it's name. Crime Alley. The place where it all started, with a punk with a gun.

It wasn't long before the scene had settled into the form of a dark alleyway. Soon the League could hear the sound of a happy child chattering away excitedly. A few seconds later he rounded the corner with his parents not far behind. The father and son appeared to be talking about energetically about Zorro and sword fighting, while the mother watched with a smile on her face. The League, except for Batman, could not see how this was a horrible memory. That quickly changed.

The League watched in horror as the memory unfolded. They all (except for Batman) tried to intervene and prevent the atrocity from being committed. But they couldn't interact with anything, they drifted through this world like ghosts. None of the League needed to ask whom the mother and father were, they had all recognized the resemblance between the boy and the Batman. They just looked at him with sadness and sorrow clear on their faces. Batman simply ignored them and maintained a stoic expression on his face.

The scene around them began to dissipate, leaving them with the mental image of an eight-year old Bruce knelt between the murdered bodies of his parents. They had all heard the promise made on the blood of his parents. The vow that sealed his fate as the Dark Knight. The oath that he had maintained to this day and would continue to do so for as long as he could.

Not long after the voice returned. "Well, that was a nice appetizer. I think it is time to move onto the main course!"


	2. Chapter 2

The League had no idea what to say to Batman regarding the memory that they had just witnessed. They had all viewed something deeply personal that was also incredibly horrific and traumatizing. Superman was clearly very angry with what his friend had had to witness at such a young age; Green Lantern was trying to remain calm but was also filled with righteous fury; Wonder Woman and the Flash both had tears streaming down their faces at the tragedy that they had just seen and J'onn fought to maintain his passive expression against the horde of emotions threatening to control him.

And Batman? There was no emotion on what you could of his face. None at all. But then again, he had relived that memory almost every night for close to thirty years. How was this any different?

Before they could even offer him any form of sympathy of support the scene around them began to shift and change. It began to turn into an oriental styles dojo. It appeared to the League to be authentic.

A younger Bruce Wayne came into focus, looking to be in his early twenties. Batman immediately recognized the memory. The League watched as Batman was being pressured into killing a murderer captured in a local village. They could see the inner turmoil, the need to please his mentor and father figure but also the need to stay true to his belief in justice and right and wrong.

They watched as he was forced to duel his mentor, eventually gaining the upper hand through luck and chance. They saw how Bruce caused the building to burn with his master trapped within. They saw the darker side to him that they had never really seen before; he had not killed Ra's Al Ghul, but he hadn't tried to save him either. He had just watched as the place burned to the ground.

The League returned to the nexus with a newfound understanding clear on all of their faces. They had known that Batman had faced hardship and trauma to some degree, but they had never realized the true extent of it. But still Batman maintained the stoic impression on his face; the emotionless mask that would allow none of them to know what thoughts existed within his mind.

Perhaps this trip through his mind would bring them closer as a team? Or perhaps it would a rift between them that could not be fixed? Only time would tell.


	3. Chapter 3

The new memory unfolded not long after the last. This one took the shape of a factory that appeared to manufacture chemicals. A younger Batman was visible upon a suspended gantry, pursuing a man in a suit with a red cape and helmet.

The gantry shook unsteadily as the two men hurtled across it. They were half way across when some of the suspending cables snapped, causing to platform to shift and shake beneath them and make them become unsteady on their feet.

The man in the red helmet fell backwards over the broken railing, with Batman rushing forward to prevent his fall. Batman managed to get a hold of the man's sleeve, preventing his fall… momentarily. The sleeve tore and the red hooded man fell, becoming immersed into a vat of green chemical waste.

Time sped forward to the chemical vat being emptied. The League was surprised to see a figure in the midst of it. The figure was heavily burnt and disfigured but that wasn't what shocked them. What shocked them was the noise that began to emerge from the figure's mouth. Laughter. High pitched, crazed, maniacal laughter that chilled them to their very souls. They realized that they had just witnessed the birthing of a monster. And they also saw why Batman always seemed to be almost protective of the Joker; he felt responsible for his creation, he saw himself as Dr. Frankenstein with the Joker as his monster.

By now the League could not believe the amount of tragedy and darkness that existed in the Dark Knight's life. How was he still sane? A darker question echoed within the depths of their minds; was he still sane?

He had always been viewed as obsessive to the point of being unstable, but what if it was more. What if he was unstable? Could the Dark Knight Detective be as insane as the criminals he fought? Was it truly possible to surround oneself with insanity and not contract it?


	4. Chapter 4

The League could not believe the horrors that they had been forced to witness; the darkness that the Batman lived with every day of his life. They looked at him with both sympathy and admiration, however he refused to make eye contact with any of them, choosing instead to stare into the darkness of his own mind.

But that is what e had been doing for almost his entire life, gazing into the darkness both within himself and within his city. He had stared into the heart of darkness and come out changed.

Superman finally gathered up enough courage to approach the Dark Knight and speak to him. "Batman… I-I'm sorry." Batman finally made eye contact with him before replying, "For what? You have nothing to apologize for." Before Superman or anyone else could say anything a new memory began to unfold before them.

The League were surprised by the setting of the next memory, how could a circus be a terrible memory? They would soon find out.

The League watched as a younger Bruce Wayne (probably in his late twenties) took his seat within the giant circus tent. They watched the many and varied acts as they were performed. Pretty soon it was time for the final act. The trapeze artists.

They listened as the act was introduced, "Aaaand now, for our final act. The amazing, the death defying, the Fabulous, Flying Graysons!" And they watched as the act progressed and they watched as the act ended. They all saw the young boy with tears in his eyes as his parents were led away on cloth-covered gurneys. But they also saw Bruce Wayne's face; filled with sadness, anger but also with compassion and understanding. Soon afterwards determination entered his features.

Time sped up. The League saw that within a week one Richard John Grayson was legally the ward of one Bruce Wayne. They saw the fall of Tony Zucco but also the rise of Robin, the Boy Wonder. They saw the rise of the Dynamic Duo.


	5. Chapter 5

By now the League had seen many dark memories of the Batman, though not all of them were horrifying and traumatizing although they were still deeply personal.

They had watched many aspects of Robin's vigilante career. They had seen the many arguments between Batman and Robin but also between Bruce and Dick. They had seen the final argument between them where Dick had abandoned the Robin Mantle and struck out on his own as Nightwing. But they had also seen the rise of a new Robin, a different Robin.

And the new Robin really was different; he was loud, brash and aggressive. He wasn't like Dick who followed Bruce's orders to the best of his ability. He forged his own destiny, one filled with beaten criminals who were injured beyond even what Batman had ever done. There was no doubt about it; the new Robin was brutal beyond belief. But despite his great rage the League saw that he genuinely cared about the people he helped; the poor, the downtrodden and the needy. He helped them because he wanted to.

But the League also noticed that as the memories went on they became more and more filled with anger and rage and righteous fury. Numerous incidents were viewed with questionable details: criminals with broken collarbones, even one incident with a death to one such criminal.

Eventually all of that rage coalesced into the final memory of Robin II, the final memory of the boy known as Jason Todd.

It all started with a birth certificate, Jason's birth certificate. For the entirety of his 16 years of life he had always believed his mother to be Catherine Todd, wife of Willis Todd. His birth certificate said different. It stated that his mother was a woman named Sheila Haywood. It didn't take much digging with the supercomputer in the Bat-Cave to discover that Sheila Haywood was still alive.

It didn't take long for him to be on the first plane to Ethiopia. However that is when things begin to spiral. The League watch captivated as Batman discovers the burned out wreckage of an abandoned warehouse. They watch as he digs desperately through the rubble until he came across two corpses. One clearly is shielding the other, one wearing the remnants of a bright red costume with a black cape. One that was clearly Jason, despite the severe burns.

They watch as Batman arranges for the body to be returned to the United States through some contacts. They watch as he discovers the CCTV footage of what had happened to Jason. They see the horrors that were inflicted upon the boy. They heard the thunk as the crowbar hit flesh again, and again, and again. Backhand. Forehand. Alternating, trying to discover which was better, all the while laughing insanely.

The League watched as the second Robin's life was ended by one sick, deranged clown. And then they watched the aftermath, they watched as the anger filled Batman with a deep, burning rage that was all consuming.

Through the memory they discovered that the Joker was still at large but they watched as the Dark Knight relentlessly hunted him, tracking him across the globe, barely stopping for rest. They watch as he finally catches up to the Joker. They watch as he mercilessly beats the Joker, hitting him with everything he's got. And then they heard the Joker say something that caused Batman to stop, "You finally gonna do it, Batsy? You finally gonna put me outta my misery? Is this gonna be the one thing that causes you to break that one little rule o' yours? God, I hope so. That would make it meaningful. I would finally have broken you." They then listened as the Joker descended into a psychotic laughing fit, wheezing due to the severe broken ribs and damaged throat.

They watched as Batman slowly backed away before calling the police to come and collect the Joker. They watched as the Batman went back to the darkness of his Cave and collapse in his chair. And they watched as the Batman, the Dark Knight Detective, tireless defender of Gotham City broke down in tears, both for what had happened and for what he had almost done.

That's when the memory dissipated around them. Batman refused to make eye contact, maintaining his sorrowful glare into the darkness of his own mind, as if daring it to show more.

The League had no idea what to say. What could they say? They had known nothing about the death of a Robin; most people hadn't really noticed a transition between Robins. To the public and the media, all Robins were the same Robin. There was no distinction between them. Nobody knew that a Robin had been brutally murdered by a crazed psychopath. No one knew that a Robin had had to pay the ultimate price. Nobody knew the pain that the Dark Knight had suffered. A pain deeper than any physical wound, a pain that haunted him still. And there was nothing they could do to comfort or support him and they knew that he would not accept either comfort or support. The Batman was truly darkness incarnate.


End file.
